Manchester United goalkeeper David De Gea has dominated headlines for all the wrong reasons after his mistake handed Chelsea an undeserved equalizer in Sunday's Premier League encounter.
With Arsenal falling at Leicester earlier in the day, both clubs had the opportunity to move a step further in the Top-4 race and it was the Red Devils who dominated proceeding in earlier minutes despite their recent poor run. Their persistence was soon rewarded with birthday-boy Juan Mata opening the scoring for the hosts in the 11th minute.
Nevertheless, Manchester United saw all of its hard work undone with just two minutes to end the first 45 minutes as a result of a goalkeeping mistake by De Gea. The Spanish shot stopper's nightmare run of form continued after he dropped a long-range effort from Antonio Rudiger straight into the path of Marcos Alonso to tap home. Watch the goal below:
Rudiger pulls up from the parking lot, Alonso easily puts the rebound in goal!
— Chelsea FC USA (@ChelseaFCinUSA) April 28, 2019
1-1!
: NBCSN | #MUNCHEpic.twitter.com/cuJ1L17XUU
At the moment, not much is going according to the script for De Gea who has made three errors resulting in goals in his last four games in all competitions for Manchester United. That is as many as he has managed collectively in his previous 123 matches for the Red Devils.
The 28-year-old goalkeeper has also been without a clean sheet in his last nine Premier League appearance, his longest concession run in a single season since joining Manchester United. While the statistics do not look good on the Spaniard's resume, it is his club that has suffered the biggest hit following Sunday's draw.
Sitting in sixth position with 64 points, the chance to gain a top-four spot is virtually out of the hands of Solskjaer's men with just two matches to go. Tottenham Hotspur could consolidate their third-place finish with a win against Bournemouth while Chelsea needs four out of the six points left to dash the hopes of the Red Devils.
Relatively, Arsenal could make a late swoop should it win its last two games against Brighton and Burnley while the Blues fail at any point.
